ACC sues DAE project director, 5 others over Tk4.75cr embezzlement

The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has filed a case against the director of a Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) project and five other officials over Tk4.75 crore embezzlement through fraud.

ACC Deputy Director Nur-E-Alam Siddique filed the case at the Integrated District Office, Dhaka-1, today (25 July), according to ACC sources.

According to the case statement seen by The Business Standard, the government undertook an initiative to construct a 5-storey office-cum-staff dormitory in the Water Treatment Plant building under the "Upgradation of Existing Plant Quarantine Laboratory at Central Packing House to International Standard (UPQWLAB) Project (1st Revised)" at the Dhaka's Shyampur under the DAE.

The ACC received a complaint, details of which could not be known immediately, alleging that the accused embezzled the project fund by submitting false bills without actually carrying out the work in this project.

On 15 July, the ACC's Enforcement Unit conducted a raid on the building.

The team first visited the Central Packing House in Shyampur. They took photographs and videos of the scene and took statements from those involved in the complaint.

Later, ACC seized and collected the relevant records from the project director SM Khalid Saifullah's office in the capital's Khamarbari.

A review of these documents revealed that the accused, in collusion with each other, fraudulently received the work and the project director passed two bills and embezzled Tk4.75 crore.

Other accused in the case are Ananta Sarkar, sub-project director of the project, Iqbal Hasan, proprietor of Multibiz International, Munir Uddin Ahmed and Md Ashrafuzzaman, senior engineers of Shaheedullah and Associates Ltd, and Md Golam Kabir, assistant mechanical engineer of DAE.